Romney wins closest Iowa caucus in history

2of6MITT ROMNEY: The former governor of Massachusetts garnered his heaviest support among non-evangelicals.Photo: Charlie Neibergall

3of6RICK SANTORUM: The former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania scored well with tea party conservatives.Photo: Justin Sullivan

4of6RON PAUL: The congressman from suburban Houston seemed to strike a chord with younger voters in Iowa.Photo: Eric Gay

5of6CHARLIE NEIBERGALL : ASSOCIATED PRESS STILL PUMPING: Mitt Romney, backed by Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., left, greets residents at a rally Tuesday in Des Moines. The former Massachusetts governor benefited in the caucuses from a six-way division of the evangelical and born-again vote.Photo: Charlie Neibergall

6of6CHARLIE RIEDEL : ASSOCIATED PRESS LATE BUMP: Rick Santorum's surge was a long time coming in Iowa, but his showing in Tuesday's caucuses sets the stage for pivotal contests in New Hampshire and South Carolina.Photo: Charlie Riedel

Get more updates from the Iowa caucus in our Campaign 2012: Iowa section.

A fractured Republican electorate yielded a photo finish in the Iowa presidential caucuses Tuesday, with establishment favorite Mitt Romney eking out an 8-vote victory over surging conservative Rick Santorum out of more than 120,000 cast.

After hours of lead changes, Iowa GOP chairman Matt Strawn announced at 1:35 a.m. CST that Romney topped Santorum, 30,0015 to 30,007. The leaders each received 25 percent of the total vote, with Texas Rep. Ron Paul third at 21 percent.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who spent more money than any other candidate in Iowa but was weakened by poor debate performances and repeated campaign gaffes, finished far back in fifth place. Perry told supporters he would return to Texas to "assess" his campaign prospects.

In a volatile campaign that has seen seven different candidates atop the polls in the past year, the inconclusive Iowa results reflect deep schisms and continuing uncertainty within a party hoping to topple President Barack Obama in the November general election.

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Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator who lost a 2006 re-election race in a landslide, emerged from the back of the presidential pack after negative advertising hurt former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, and campaign missteps doomed Perry and Georgia businessman Herman Cain.

Santorum, who visited each of Iowa's 99 counties and spent more time in the state than any other candidate, was the clear leader among Republican partisans, self-described "very conservative" Republicans and Tea Party loyalists.

Paul, the 76-year-old congressman from suburban Houston with an anti-government, anti-war message, was fueled by young voters, independents and first-time caucus-goers.

According to entry polls done for Associated Press and television networks, voters under the age of 30 increased from 11 percent to 15 percent and gave 52 percent of their votes to Paul. Among independents, who increased from 13 percent to 24 percent over the past four years, Paul led with 48 percent. Another key component in the Paul coalition: liberal and moderate Republicans, who cast 43 percent of their votes for Paul.

Romney benefited from a six-way division of the Evangelical and born-again vote. The former Massachusetts governor led by a wide margin among non-evangelical voters, elderly voters and Iowans who said that electability was important. But he fared poorly among Tea Party loyalists and trailed Santorum among conservatives.

In the end, Romney received the same percentage of the Iowa vote that he did four years ago in a resounding loss to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. After predicting a victory this past weekend, Romney raised the stakes for his caucus performance.

"This is his second go-round and the field is arguably weaker, so expectations were higher," said conservative strategist Keith Appell.

The results were bad news for three candidates who finished far behind the leaders after investing heavily in the Hawkeye State. Gingrich, the target of venomous television attacks from Perry, Paul and Romney, slipped to fourth place with 13 percent. Clearly bitter about Romney's air war, Gingrich said Tuesday that he would continue to fight to prevent "a Massachusetts moderate" from winning the nomination."We are not going to go out and run nasty ads," Gingrich told supporters. "But I do reserve the right to tell the truth."

Perry, who had roared into first place in late August after emerging briefly as the top choice of social conservatives and Tea Party Republicans, tumbled to fifth place with 10 percent. Perry told a crowd of supporters: "With the voters' decision tonight in Iowa, I decided to return to Texas, assess the results of tonight's caucus, determine whether there is a path forward for myself in this race ... With a little prayer and reflection I'm going to decide the best path forward."

Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann, who finished first in Iowa's summertime presidential straw poll, finished last among the six candidates who campaigned in the Hawkeye State.

Republican consultant Steve Schmidt, a former adviser to 2008 GOP nominee John McCain, said their poor Iowa finishes were likely to doom the bottom two finishers.

"After tonight, I don't think Rick Perry has a plausible path, Michelle Bachmann doesn't have a plausible path," Schmidt said. "It's going to be emotional in the Rick Perry suite tonight, in the Michele Bachman suite tonight. No one wants to be the first person on the phone to say, 'It's over for you.'"

The Iowa results set the stage for two pivotal contests in the next three weeks, New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation primary next Tuesday and the first Southern showdown in South Carolina on Jan. 21.

Romney is a heavy favorite in neighboring New Hampshire, where he is well-known, well-organized, well-funded and owns a summer home on New Hampshire's Lake Winnipesaukee. He is counting on momentum from New Hampshire to carry him to victory in South Carolina, where a divided field of social conservatives could allow Romney to eke out a victory with under 30 percent of the vote, just like eventual GOP nominee John McCain did four years ago.

Santorum, whose campaign is short on money and thin on organization beyond Iowa, will try to unite social conservatives in coming weeks to become the right's alternative to Romney. But the Pennsylvanian's path to the nomination is blocked by Gingrich and Bachmann, both of whom promised Tuesday to fight on.

"While it's wonderful to do well in Iowa, what about beyond?" asked Bill Whalen, a GOP consultant and research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. "We saw it four years ago with Mike Huckabee: his was not a campaign tailored to 50 states."

Analysts said Paul will be hard-pressed to replicate Tuesday's performance in upcoming contests."Iowa is Ron Paul's high water mark," said Ari Fleischer, former press secretary to former President George W. Bush. "It's all downhill from here."

Paul faces a significant political hurdle in early primary states such as South Carolina and Florida from hawkish voters who disagree with the Texas congressman's opposition to an interventionist American foreign policy _ a liability the candidate acknowledges.

"I recognize my challenge," Paul told a Republican caucus in Ankeny. But he insisted that his approach was "the road to peace and prosperity."

The Iowa results reflect a volatile electorate uncertain of the best candidate to confront President Obama in the general election. The candidates and political action committees supporting them spent $16 million in TV advertising in Iowa, inundating Iowans not only on the airwaves but with pre-recorded "robocalls" and campaign literature.

"Sometimes I was getting 20 robocalls a day," said Linda Crookham-Hansen, a 43-year-old lighting company employee who lives in Oskaloosa. Her sister, Dianne Crookham-Johnson, an attorney in Oskaloosa, was getting six before noon and another half dozen over the dinner hour.

While the Republicans engaged in internecine political warfare, Obama was unopposed in Iowa's Democratic caucuses. The president held a webcast with Iowa voters Tuesday outlining his vision for a second term, leaving the partisan attacks to Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz. The Florida congresswoman focused on Romney, portraying him as an unprincipled panderer.

"Over the last year, Romney has scrambled to get to the right of Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum," she said at a Des Moines press conference. "He is leaving Iowa with significant primary baggage that will weigh him down in the general election."

Richard S. Dunham is the Washington bureau chief for the Houston Chronicle and Hearst Newspapers, which publishes 15 daily newspapers across the United States. He is also the creator and chief author of the popular political blog ?Texas on the Potomac? on chron.com and mysanantonio.com.

Dunham has offered political analysis on ABC, CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, the PBS News Hour and SiriusXM Satellite Radio. He also has appeared on C-SPAN, the BBC, National Public Radio, ABC Radio, Fox News Channel and more than a dozen radio stations and networks from Brownsville to New Zealand. From 2005 to 2009, he wrote a ?Letter from America? column for the Finnish newspaper Aamulehti in explaining U.S. politics and culture to an international audience.

He also is the creator and host of the reporters? roundtable program that is broadcast as part of the radio series From the National Press Club.

Dunham has covered every American presidential election since 1980. From 1992 to July 2007, he was the national political correspondent for Business Week magazine, covering the White House, Congress and national political trends. He previously spent seven years in the Washington bureau of the Dallas Times Herald as a national political reporter, congressional correspondent and Supreme Court correspondent. During his 13 years at the Dallas Times Herald, he also was a political correspondent in the Austin bureau and a city desk reporter in Dallas.

Dunham also has written for the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and he has contributed to three books ("The Founding City," Chilton Books, 1976, "The Handbook of Campaign Spending," Congressional Quarterly Press, 1992, and ?The Almanac of the Unelected,? Bernan Press, 2006). He wrote a new foreword to the 60th anniversary edition of his grandfather Barrows Dunham?s classic philosophy book, ?Man against Myth,? which was republished in 2007.

A graduate of Central High School in Philadelphia, Dunham holds B.A. and M.A. degrees in history from the University of Pennsylvania. He resides in Arlington, Virginia, with his wife, Pam Tobey, a native of Silsbee, Texas, who works as a graphic artist at the Washington Post.